Florida State Football just had its best season in almost a decade, and despite a brutal slap to the face that we’re still not over (the CFP still sucks), we know that we’re so lucky to have had amazing players, coaches, and staff helping make this team what it is.
One person we owe a ton of thanks to is head coach Mike Norvell. Norvell was announced to be FSU Football’s head coach in December 2019, but the road to playoff contention wasn’t an easy one. Norvell’s first two seasons as head coach weren’t pretty, going 3-6 and 5-7. Things started to look up in the 2022 season, going 10-3. This past season was the best yet, going 13-1 and winning the ACC Championship. Coach Norvell completely turned the football program around, helping the team look like it did in 2013.
A major event in the college football world over the last few months was the retirement announcement of long-time University of Alabama head coach Nick Saban. This led to major speculation over who would lead the famed Alabama football team next season. Lots of eyes pointed to Mike Norvell, but FSU wasn’t ready to let him go that easily.
Norvell announced that he would be staying at FSU as head coach for another eight years on a contract extension and is being paid an insane amount to do so. My broke college student brain can’t even comprehend this, but Norvell is being paid $10M a year.
True, football is a major part of FSU culture and Mike Norvell does wear lots of hats as head coach, recruiting players, making plays, running practice, and coaching games. But $10M is crazy when compared to what the people who are actually helping us get our degrees are making.
Professors at FSU make an average nine-month salary of $140K. However, a majority of professors at FSU are actually labeled associate and assistant professors. The average nine-month salary for an associate professor is $100K and $91K for an assistant professor. These numbers seem high compared to Florida high school teachers, but they all must pay rent, food, and student loans, and often for a family as well.
Football is a major income for Florida State, bringing in millions of dollars annually. Still, most importantly, FSU is a university, and although we often forget, we’re here to get a degree to help us in our career fields, not in college football.
FSU is now starting a lawsuit to leave the ACC, which will cost more than $500M, a massive amount of money that most students believe can be used elsewhere. The money could go into fixing the asbestos in the Bellamy building (I would stay out of the basement), building more on-campus housing for students, or finally getting the growing College of Communication its academic building outside of University Center C in the stadium.
FSU is a rapidly growing institution garnering lots of national and international credit. It has become one of the most respected institutions in the state, let alone the country. To continue this rise in rankings, they might want to start considering balancing out the salaries of football coaches with professors and really prioritize where our money is spent.
I wish Mike Norvell and FSU Football all the best in the 2024 season. I will be at every home game and hopefully, the CFP will let us into the playoff this time. I will also try to be more forgiving to my professors when they take quite a while to grade my midterm papers. After all, they’re not being paid at a football coach level.
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